Ten’s share slumps to record low as dancing fails to deliver
Channel Ten struggled to gain an audience last night, only managing to draw a 6.4 per cent audience share, its lowest since the introduction of OzTam in 2001.
The struggling network was beaten by ABC1 which had a share of 11.1 per cent, while rivals Seven posted a 29.6 per cent share of audience, while Nine had 26.4 per cent of viewers.
The network’s digital channel One posted the strongest of any digital channel with its coverage of the final events at the Sochi Winter Olympic Games getting 5.1 per cent, while the main channel focussed on entertainment shows.
So You Think You Can Dance, which has been moved to 7.30pm to avoid direct competition with its reality rivals only managed 378,000 viewers according to preliminary overnight metro ratings from OzTam. However it is an improvement on the show’s 313,000 last week in the earlier 6.30pm timeslot.
Channel 10 buying full page colour ads in the paper is not going to make people watch your second failed dance show. Robbie Williams is not a draw card. If we want to watch him sing we have youtube. Play some sport people like or some scripted drama and wait five years for your brand to rebuild.
On a night when tens of thousand of australians stood in the streets to protest Manus island and the death of a refugee, 10 gave us an irrelevant dance show.
Channel 10 has the opportunity to lead and grab viewers. At the same time, instead of following the typical crap, set yourselves apart and start reporting in a different way from the others.
Oh course we all think we are experts, but Id start by suggesting 10 wipe “the project” which actually drives a massive wedge against Ten expanding (ageing) their demographic. Next is the creation of a “TodayTonight / A Current Affair” style program that would fill the programming void that 7 and 9 have left wide open. Im available for a fee.
it’s a shame, considering it was up against Sunday Night whose core demo is different. As for live sport and scripted drama Billy C – what do you call The Big Bash League, Sochi? Motor-sport is about to start and the Commonwealth Games will be on in July….
The buck stops with the CEO simple fact. Not only are the ratings at record low levels so is the revenue. Name a client who woke this morning and said, must tell my agency to buy 10 with that schedule I am about to approve.
The scary thing is agencies are still advising clients to buy 10. What client in their right mind would want to be on a channel where audience share last night on their main station was 6.4% in metro, and just 4.2% in regional? Does it really matter if the CPT is lower when you are only reaching 4.2% of all people? When does common sense come into play with spread sheet media planners? If my agency advises me to put 10 on the schedule they’ll soon have one less client on their books.
What the Offal does Manus islands punch up have to do with Ten’s market share? Why do the left extremists use this forum for their views? Tens of thousands of Australian’s is a drop in the bucket! and not a optimum tv style audience anyway.
They are great at marketing to their existing audience which is sliding but don’t know how to market outside of their own box. TEN are in serious trouble, the CEO has to take responsibility and they need some decent shows which apparently was all David Mott’s problem. Things have gone backwards since they let him go – bad move.
@Steve
It is called competition and group deals, 7 & 9 don’t offer up big discounts to be nice. They do it not to lose business, if every agency dropped 10, good luck getting on 7 & 9
So many clients don’t understand the realities of trading TV. It isn’t a matter of picking up the phone and saying I’ll have MKR that did well last night
Haha Steve, name one client that has its demographic set as total people….let’s not get caught up with total people numbers. There is still a place for 10 on all Metro TV buys…media planners/buyers who base scedules on total people numbers instead of its target demographic shoudn’t be in the industry. Your opinion is disadvantaging your clients bottom line.
@rplanet.
My point is that 10 have lost the market.
They dont have any demographic and the “left” is a currently under serviced area. It is an opportunity for 10 to rebrand and begin to develop into a growth area.
9 and 7 have got right wing lunatic sorted with TT and ACA (or what they now call “news”) etc. 10 has The Project, one of its highest rating shows and a clear indication of where they can find a market.
They can continue to chase (and continue to fail) or they can re target and perhaps offer something different?
spare a thought for the account managers at Ten…….who still have the GSM banging the table and wanting results!!!
Astute shareholders would have sold their shares last week and enjoyed the brief rise while it lasted. It is amazing that stock brokers recommended Ten in their portfolio based on summer ratings. A change in ownership followed by wholesale change of board and management is likely to be the only solution for Ten as it chews up its capital and the bank starts knocking once again. And while Ten has a bit more sport, light entertainment and reality programming has hit an international plateau for ideas. Local ideas are the key if you have management capable of developing them. Just ask Tim Worner at Seven.
Headline should have read, Ten shares up 17% from this time last month despite ratings failure. But that wouldn’t get you to click it.
@J – Sochi has done very little for them. Nobody is ovely interested in the Commonwealth Games. The swimming will get them a few nights of okay ratings.
The Big Bash League was admitedly good for them over summer. They need AFL, League or Cricket. The Car Racing is fine for Saturday afternoons but it’s not going to get them decent viewers. 6.4 percent will see them beaten by SBS at least once this year. They are in so much trouble is difficult to know where to start but I don’t see how keeping the Project going is helping.
@steve the scary thing really is you making outlandish statements based on numbers from one night (this article is also based on numbers from one night)….don’t get ahead of yourself. I am a media buyer and will continue to reccomend buying TEN to my clients whose auidence isn’t 55+. If clients want ROI they will have TEN on the schedule…this is an educated statement which has been proven over and over again…unlike yours.
@hmmmm so your a CEO?
Does anyone actually watch the project? That annoying host with the quiff hair is just dreadful. And the way they intertwine their comedy with the news of the day which usually involves a murder, car crash or worse, is just in such bad taste and so incredibly awkward.
@ steve. In contrast if my agency didn’t buy some TEN I would be looking for a new agency. As a marketer I am buying eyeballs at a cost and TEN gives me this cheaper than the others which allows me more for the others. Unless you can tell me that TEN viewers spend less on my product than viewers on SEVEN and NINE, which obviously you cant because they don’t.. The reality is no one watches just one network – across a week most people watch shows across all 3 networks so if you’re ignoring TEN you are missing out.
Offal, on a night when sensible Australians weighed the single (though still tragic) Manus Island death against the 1000 plus deaths under the former Labor government and Greens endorsed policies, the rest of us were watching decent stuff on Channels 7 and 9.
DTM – no I am not nowadays but I was.
Media Error #3. 6.4% is its Share not its Reach. If you don’t understand the difference (along with single day, All People, zone not program etc.) then better to stay silent.
Bye bye Matt & Hamish show
Shocking start to the official ratings year, and not 1 night of 6.4 share of all people that contributors are getting caught up in, but plenty of nights. 10 PR will spin a million ways on demographics, but in the end you get your reach on 7 and 9 and pay for it, so the ad is seen on mass, and then those agencies that work on guaranteed CPT and they do, buy cheap and cheerful 10 to amortise the national CPT.
When I was at TEN a lifetime ago, I came up with the followig and put it to Programming “Nine has sport (at the time), Seven has British comedy and dull movies with some local soaps, we are T. E. N. Let’s brand as TEN – The Entertainment Network. Then we corner that market, do entertainment reporting, grab the Logies, Academy Awards, Grammys. All glamour and glitter, waddya say?”
Guess what. I was told “there isn’t enough entertainment in Australia. Good idea though”
If only.
NOW they are trapped: they need strong shows to promote during News, they need strong News to propagate the promos. They need a reasonable morning show to be able to drag Guests in and promote evening shows.
Every morning after there’s a Reality Hapening, the Evictee or Winner or Dancer has to be on breakfast to be interviewed and they need to be briefed to promo upcoming possibilities on their Reality Show (next one out, or in, or injured, or screwed by the bear, whatever).
PLUS, TEN needs the two, no; THREE things they can never have;
They need a STAR for mornings. (not impossible…)
They need understanding of the Audience/Promo/Ratings nexus (not hard…)
They need Management that lets Creative Go At It. (hardest of all..)
The idea that TV is a COMMODITY pervades maagement circles. If someone is successful in one field, they can successfully translate that to running a TV Station or Network seems to be somehow accepted by these MBAs.
Who would say a footall star can be a golfing star? Some can, but the logic doesn’ hold for all. There are personal qualities that make a General successful in battle but different qualities make a Statesman or Diplomat.
TEN has always been an embattled workplace. Hard men and women competing internally for big bucks and power. We were more inerested in internal ratings than against other channels in my time there. “We won” “Against Nine?” “Screw Nine, we beat The Reporters”.
What’s that schaudenfraude? However it is spelled, we had plenty.
I remember a whole Department being delighted a rival executive ran over his child in his driveway. Seriously. The child was injured but not badly. A whole room full of people laughed when they heard the news. Like I say, a very tough place.
(anyone doubting this story, I can name names).
Despite it being a “dry” station, I remember one night drinking champers in the Boardroom where I went from promoted to fired to re-hired in just a few hours and ended up Producer of an Election Telecast. Ultimately I ddn’t work on the Election Night but that’s another story.
There was naughtiness too.
Not sure how to quickly tell the story which ends “I saw you screwing my wife last night, I’ll shut up if you promote my girlfriend to Producer so we can travel together”
Maybe best let it be.
It ended for me when there was a coup and those of us “belonging” to the deposed Exec joined him “Special Projects.”
For non-TV folk, “Special Projects” is a Department where you get a desk with a phone and nothing to do.
TV must be one of the few businsses where people get punished by being given nothing to do.
Now that most people don’t even watch TV (why watch a show with insulting advertising every 10-15mins when you can watch it without? *thankyou internet), the percentages of who is watching what must be useless. 1000 people here 200 people there…I dare them to talk about real numbers…and not 1500 hand selected homes (ratings based on selected homes has always been fraudulent; shame they haven’t made a law to prosecute the CEOs for it). The real numbers would be…Channel XYZ in Canberra: total viewers prime time: 14,000. Maybe though it’s not the industry who are the fools here; maybe it’s the advertisers who pay for the existence. $Thousands per second…now THAT is stupid lol
@Stats,
There are people that still watch tv, don’t download, and would pay for good old fashioned quality entertainment – these are the over 50 year olds, and in the next few years, these numbers are only going to get bigger and bigger …. but 7,9 and 10 are ignoring this segment ….. to their own detriment …..this would be a significant boost to ten’s branding if they pursued this segment ……
Haha anyone on here defending TEN obviously works for them, you can not defend a 6% share, no matter how many free spots you get
I’m with you bitter and twisted. I don’t understand why the project has run for so long. Especially Charlie, what am I missing here?
If someone can tell me why I’d be interested to know.
“tens of thousand of australians stood in the streets to protest Manus island and the death of a refugee,”
– @ offal 10.49am, why don’t you mourn the 1100+ refugees that died under Labor’s failed policies? Isn’t that 1100 times worse that one poor bugger dying?
the buck does ultimately stop with the CEO. James Warburton was given just a few months before he was pushed out the door in the face of results that were actually better than those being achieved by current management.. Why is Hamish McClennan being given so much more time/latitude? His Murdoch Connections perchance?